Into the Longbox

I'm going to say this right off the bat, Disney needs to slow their roll with all these Star Wars films. We go over thirty years without a new Star Wars film (that's right, in my version of history, those prequels never happened) and now we are getting one every year. I think they are doing a disservice to these mainline stories that are supposed to continue the franchise. It is starting to not feel as special as it should. With that off my chest, I can say that I enjoyed the Last Jedi. I don't fall into the trappings of a lot of the nerd rage out there for this film, but I had my own set of problems. Beware, there may be spoilers. I'm not perfect! Following Rey on her journey in this new trilogy has been a breath of fresh air. I know many of us want to have the same old thing. We were especially starved thanks to those horrible prequels. That they chose to have that history as a backdrop, but to go in new directions has been great. I also like that Rey has been...

Oh, DC. I swear I am not actively rooting against you just because I'm a Marvel fanboy. Competition makes both of the companies better. However, as far as the movies go, DC is like a Triple AAA baseball team and Marvel is the big leagues. Wonder Woman gained so much good will from me, but in the back of my mind, I figured Justice League wouldn't be able to build on that momentum. Let's be frank here. Justice League is a bad movie. It occasionally has some cool moments, but that is not enough to save it. The argument I always make for those inevitable Avengers vs. Justice League movie comparisons is this simple fact. The Marvel universe took a slow, methodical approach to get to their movies. They took a calculated risk by getting tentpole movies out for their main players of Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk and Thor. Once those were successes, they had the foundation to build the Avengers movie. You had a natural anticipation that built and built and culminated in t...

I took my time with the Punisher, something I haven't done with the other Marvel shows. I'll be honest, I wasn't as excited for it as I was for the other shows. That is nothing against this show, I just think I am experiencing comic book show fatigue right now. However, I will say this. The first season of Punisher was good. I will also say that is easily the most violent of the Marvel shows, which should surprise no one that has a working knowledge of the character. His scenes in season two of Daredevil were clear evidence of what we might expect. What I didn't expect was a deep dive into PTSD that this show traverses down. Surprisingly, it didn't feel completely ham fisted. It is definitely in your face and they do not hide from it, but I think it accurately demonstrates how each soldier is changed by their experiences and how they deal with it. The central characters in this show were soldiers in one way or another and the effects on them are shown through...

The news of Brian Michael Bendis leaving Marvel to go to DC is way too big for me NOT to mention. This is big because for the last seventeen years, Bendis has been the pre-eminent writer at Marvel. Whether you know this or not, I would argue that he was responsible for the resurgence of the Avengers. Before Bendis, I NEVER touched the avengers. I didn't read their books at all. I deemed them too corny. Lest we forget, around this time, Iron Man was a C level character at best in my opinion. It wasn't until Robert Downey Jr. came along that he became A-list. Bendis broke down the Avengers and built up a new team that felt like more of a collection of his favorite characters than traditional Avengers. You had Captain America and Iron Man, but then you got Spider-Man, Wolverine, Spider-Woman and Luke Cage. Then a mystery character like Ronin and Sentry. Suddenly, these Avengers were cool and I began reading them. On the other side of this, Bendis had been working on Ultimate S...

I really need to get my posts up sooner. Anyways, it's been a week since I saw Thor: Ragnarok, but I wanted to talk about it before I forget everything that I saw! Or maybe, I just need to go see it a second time. Hmmm... This will sound like hyperbole, but Thor: Ragnarok has jumped into my personal top five of the Marvel films. I enjoyed this movie that much. It had what the last few outings (re: Doctor Strange, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2) lacked. Fun. Now I know you will talk about how funny the Guardians of the Galaxy movie was. Yes, the FIRST one was funny. The second one had jokes that went on too long and tried too hard at times. Am I retroactively contradicting my earlier review? Probably. You expect me to go back and re-read my own stuff?? In a conscious effort to keep my reviews shorter, let me get into what I loved about this movie. The logo and the trailers had an an 80's rock synth bent to it and that carried through in all the musical choices. I absolu...

In a move that is rare to me, I binge watched this entire show in an entire day... a few weeks ago! I had just got back from a long business trip and I took the day off. I was determined to fight off sleep and binge watch this show. I did, so now let me talk about it. I waited a few weeks to say anything because I didn't want to color anyone's opinion on it. I also didn't want to be like, "FIRST!". Let's ignore the fact that I basically just did that. Anyways, here we have the Defenders. The culmination of all those netflix shows we have endured so far. I was super excited about this and waited with anticipation. I was not disappointed. Like the super critical person that I have become, there were still things I didn't like, but overall, it was very satisfying. Like any good comic book crossover, you get to see characters interact with each other that normally wouldn't. This includes secondary characters as well, which is where some of the fun c...

Wow. That is what I had to say after watching Spider-Man: Homecoming a few days ago. The latest movie in a franchise that has been rebooted for the third time within the last fifteen years. Let's think about how crazy that is. Sony really doesn't want to let this franchise go. If this movie is any indication, they should just let Marvel be involved in any future movies. I feel like this is the most grounded Spider-Man movie we've had so far. The first movie where it takes place in a high school and it ACTUALLY feels like it. It looks like I already delved into my review of this movie, so let's just keep it going. There were many reasons I liked this movie and why I now hail it as the best Spider-Man movie so far. First of all, Tom Holland is the perfect pick for Peter Parker/Spider-Man. Here you have a kid that has these powers and he wants to do right by them. As a teenager, he also wants to be seen as someone who is worthy to be sent up to the big leagues, show...

I am really surprised that I waited so long to write this. I saw Wonder Woman after a long drive during opening weekend. I don't have a good reason, but I'm here now! So, Wonder Woman. This is the DC movie we DESERVE. Finally, the powers that be saw fit to give us a movie from the DC Universe that is legitimately good. After suffering through Superman Returns, Green Lantern, Man of Steel, Batman V. Superman and Suicide Squad, DC finally gets one right. You'll notice I didn't include the Batman movies, even though I will gladly throw Dark Knight Rises under that same bus. Anyways, this was a great movie. It is a bona fide super hero movie. Gone is the angst that DC brings to their movies. We finally get a movie that is full of color. Literally, it's not steeped in gray tones. Since I've only watched this movie once and that was a few weeks ago, this might be shorter than normal because I'm working on what is a faulty memory. It's my own fault. I ...

I watched the new Guardians of the Galaxy movie a week ago. Due to work and life in general, I have not had a chance to really sit down and write about it until now. My snap judgements will have faded, but the movie still left an impression. If I've learned one thing over the past couple of years, I've become more critical of movies and sometimes hard to please, depending on the source material. I am happy to report that I really did like this movie. I had a couple of issues, but overall this movie was a lot of fun. I still think the first movie is better, but this is a worthy successor. Let me dive right in. Warning, there might be Spoilers . I'll discuss the things I didn't like first. You know, just to mix it up a bit. At some points in this movie, I think it got too cute for it's own good. There were scenes that lasted longer than they needed to. For instance, the opening sequence. While cool visually, they stayed with it too long. Basically, the camera...

What we have here is the last show in the four planned Marvel shows that would lead into the big "Defenders" crossover event. I'm not going to mince words, I did not like this show. Part of me was afraid I would be influenced by all the negative press this show had garnered before it was released. I was hoping it was all wrong and that this show would surprise me. Unfortunately, they were right. This is a bad show. That statement isn't confined to just one thing. There are many things I didn't like about this show. Let me just say, I really like the character, Iron Fist. More specifically, I like the team he makes with Luke Cage. The Ed Brubaker/Matt Fraction years from a couple of years ago is required reading for Iron Fist as far as I'm concerned. So this show hurts. First of all, the most egregious part of this show is that the martial arts is terrible. For a show that is about a guy who is a master of Kung Fu, this show fails to deliver on the mos...

Logan is the Wolverine movie that we have always wanted. It's a shame because this is supposedly the last iteration of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. If it truly is, then he goes out on top. I really loved this movie and I think this movie speaks to the sensibilities I've migrated to over the past few years. I know I have stated this many times on this blog before, but I've become more attracted to the focused, centralized comic book movie. I no longer care about a super hero movie that has world ending stakes. I feel like there are no stakes in that. It all comes down to how cool the action sequences are. Not to sound like an old man, but they've become special effects spectacles and not always in a good way. That is why a movie like, Logan is so refreshing. Here we have a story that is focused on the personal battles of a few characters. Dare I say, this is like a chase movie. A genre that has become a favorite of mine. Hmm, I'm three paragraphs in and I hav...

Every year, I tell myself that I will have this up by January. And every time it comes a few weeks into the year, after the point a best of list should have already happened. Looks like I have a resolution for 2018! Anyways, last year I talked about how my interest in DC had waned. This year, with DC Rebirth, I have jumped back on to a couple of titles. The reboot (not reboot) has seemed to energize them. On the other hand, the delay of Civil War and everything in it’s hemisphere has made me question a lot of my choices over at Marvel. I have not been a fan of the double shipping that both companies have been employing this year. This quantity over quality is causing the art to suffer on a lot of books and that is a problem. Since they keep making money, I’m afraid this is a practice that will continue. This year I think I have finally started to get more selective with my books. I cut a number of fringe books, especially if I feel like they are a chore to read. We also had a ...